Wrong Time (25 page)

“I know, but come on. Just help me
wheel it over to one of them as close as possible,” Lee said, and then the two
of them pushed the cart in front of one of the middle stalls.

“All right, move back,” Lee said and
then started to try to lift the device.

“You can’t lift that by yourself.”
 

“You just watch me.”

 
To his credit, he did lift the device for
about a second. As he lifted the device off the cart, he felt something crack
in his back, and he dropped it to the floor. Lee too crumbled to the floor.

“Oh, that’s great! Let’s just drop the
big exploding thing on the floor,” Trish said sarcastically.

Lee only stayed on the floor and moaned
in pain.

“You’re really hurt, aren’t you?” Trish
asked and rushed to his side.

“I’ll be fine. Just help me roll this thing
into the stall so we can get out of this God forsaken place,” Lee said and slowly
stood.

His back was killing him, but what else
could he do but stand up? It’s not like he could just lie on the floor of a
building that was about to explode. The two of them rolled the bomb into the
stall, shut it, and exited the bathroom. As they were attempting to leave the
building, one person was watching them. An enemy soldier was lying on the
floor. He had been wounded, but he was still conscious, and his weapon still
contained one bullet. He wouldn’t normally have taken on two people with a
single bullet, but his life was expiring, and in his mind, if he had to die, so
did at least one of the people who killed him. He grabbed his weapon, aimed,
and fired. Lee heard the sound and turned around. Trish crumbled to the floor.
Lee froze. He didn’t know who to turn his attention to. Should he concentrate
on Trish or the shooter? After a few seconds that felt like days to Lee, he
pulled a pistol out that he had been keeping on his side and pointed it at the
wounded man lying on the floor. With a gentle squeeze, he ended the man’s life.
Normally, Lee would have felt bad about taking a life, but that person may have
just taken the one person Lee had ever cared about in a romantic way. There was
no regret in him. In fact, Lee was happy with his decision. He then turned his
attention to Trish.

“Are you okay? Where are you hit?” Lee
asked.

“Can’t you see?” Trish asked.

It didn’t take long for Lee to see the
source of the blood coming from her. Trish had been shot in the lower stomach.

“I’m going to get you out of here,” Lee
said, and then as gently as he could, he scooped her up in his arms.

He began running from the building. The
jerking from the running hurt Trish, but he was more concerned with her losing
too much blood if he didn’t hurry. Once he finally reached the area where Zane
and the others were, he was glad to see that a medical team was on site.

“Oh, thank God,” Lee said.

“What happened?” Zane asked and ran to
Lee.

“Everything’s set, but Trish got shot
as we were leaving.”

Zane was glad that he had requested
medical assistance when they arrived that night. Alfred was leery of this,
considering that this whole operation was a secret, but he had done as Zane requested
and found some people with the proper medical credentials who he trusted to
help them. Zane made the call to Sam. Lee, meanwhile, ran to Trish’s side. No
matter what happened, Lee determined that it was going to take an act of God to
pry him from her side. The two of them rode away in the back of an ambulance.

Sam answered the phone.

“Are we in the clear?” Sam asked.

“Yes, you have five minutes to get
everyone clear of the blast zone,” Zane answered.

“All right, I’m on it,” Sam said and
hung up the phone.

Sam immediately started yelling for
everyone to retreat and grabbed Nathan’s hand. The two of them ran down the
stairs and moved as quickly as possible out of the building. They didn’t stop
running until they were a good distance away from it, and then they ducked down
an alley.

“What are we doing?” Nathan asked.

“Just wait. I want to see the blast,”
Sam said.

As they stood there, several of their
squad members ran by, and after enough time had passed for Sam to suspect that
it was almost time for the bomb to go off, she and Nathan stepped out of the
alleyway. Within a few seconds, the blast was heard, and they could feel the
heat. Nathan felt somewhat bad about what he was seeing, but it was becoming
easier to be involved in things like this. That fact, within itself, scared him
a little bit. Sam just stood there staring. It might not have been right, but
she felt happy that the people who were responsible for so much death were now burning.

“Do you think Markus was in there?”
Nathan asked.

“We can only hope so,” Sam said and
grabbed his hand.

Nathan tugged at her, and the two of
them started walking in Zane’s direction.

Chapter 26

When Nathan and Sam finally arrived at Zane’s
location, Michael ran up to them with a worried expression on his face.

“What’s wrong?” Nathan asked.

“It’s Trish. She’s hurt really bad. We
all need to get to the hospital as soon as we can,” Michael said.

Sam and Nathan quickly changed out of their
gear, and the group piled into a couple of cars. Zane stopped them before they
left.

“I wish I could go with you. I have to
finish up here, but please let me know something as soon as you can,” Zane
said.

“We will. Don’t worry,” Nathan said and
then began to drive.

“How bad is it?” Sam asked.

“We actually weren’t around to see, but
Zane said it was a gunshot wound,” Michael said.

Jess only sat in the back seat and
worried. Trish had become a good friend to her. She worked with her every day,
and she couldn’t imagine her day without her anymore. She kept thinking back to
when they first met each other. Even then, when Trish was kidnapping her, she could
see the good in Trish. That night was when they became friends, and Jess
couldn’t shake the thought that she may be losing one of her best friends.
After seeing her concern, Michael extended a hand to her. Jess refused the hand
and instead, grabbed on to him. He hadn’t expected it, but he embraced her as
she cried.

* * * * *

At the hospital, Lee was forced to
separate from Trish as they wheeled her away from him. The wound seemed bad to
Lee. He wished he could have found the words to say to her before she left for
what could have been the last time. Instead, he only stared and held her hand.
He looked more scared through the whole ordeal than she had. Why in the hell
did something like this have to happen to us anyway, Lee wondered and kicked
over a small garbage can as he was entering the waiting room. Lee was beyond angry.
He was mad at himself. Why couldn’t he protect the one person he loved, and why
would God take the one person who meant something to him? He had so much anger
and frustration built up inside him that he didn’t know where to aim it all.
Punishing the garbage can certainly hadn’t done any good. As he sat down and
thought about everything that had just transpired and how much his life was
probably about to change, a voice interrupted his train of thought.

“How is she?” Nathan asked in desperation.

“I don’t know,” Lee said quietly.

“How bad was it? Where was she hit?”
Sam asked.

“She was shot in the stomach. I hope that
I wasn’t too slow. I just hope she’s okay,” Lee said in a way that reflected
how mentally and physically exhausted he was.

Back at the facility, he had pulled
something in his back, but when Trish was wounded, all the pain became an
afterthought. He was able to carry her several blocks despite his injury, but
he was finally starting to feel the effects on his back. The very fact that he
felt bad physically and that he was feeling sorry for himself made him feel
even worse. Was he not being selfish? What right did he have to feel sorry for
himself or concentrate on his own pain when he had failed to protect Trish?

“Lee, everything’s going to be okay. I
promise,” Nathan said.

Nathan couldn’t really guarantee that everything
would be fine, but he had to say something. He had never seen Lee look so
defeated, and he didn’t want Lee to give up on Trish before they even knew anything.

“You can’t know that everything will be
okay. You didn’t see her. She was so fragile and so cold. I thought that the
life was going to drain from her at any moment back in the ambulance.”

Sam sat down on the other side of Lee.

“We can’t promise you that everything’s
going to be fine, but please don’t make the mistake of underestimating her.
She’s lived through more in her lifetime than almost any of us can comprehend.
Just look at what she’s gone through over the last few days, and she came out
of it okay. Before you assume the worst, just wait for some news. Most
importantly, know that you did everything you could possibly do in this
situation,” Sam said.

Before Lee could respond to her
statement, Jason, Burt, and Dan joined everyone in the waiting room.

“How is she?” Jason asked.

Michael pulled them to the side and
explained the situation. Burt had gotten pressure on his wound and was quickly
escorted by a doctor and several nurses to the back. Lee just sat there quietly
on the edge of a feeling that he didn’t fully comprehend. He didn’t know if he
wanted to burst into tears or if he wanted to irrationally go off on everyone
in the room for pretending that anything that had happened today was okay.
After seeing the look in Lee’s eyes, Jess motioned for Nathan and Sam to move,
and she sat down beside him.

“I’m not going to feed you some story
about how everything’s all right, and I’m certainly not going to assume that I
know how you feel, but please hear me now. Trish is one of my best friends. I’m
so glad that you and she have grown close to one another. When she fell apart
and no one, including me, could heal her, somehow you did. When she needed more
than a shoulder to cry on, you were there, and now, more than ever, she’s going
to need you. If she’s okay, I need . . . no, she will need you to pull yourself
together. You got her out of that place, so no one is blaming you for what
happened, if that’s what you’re thinking. I guess what I’m asking is for you to
do what you seem to do best. See the best in this situation. She’s still here,
and as far as we all know right now, you’re going to get a chance to see her
again. When you do get that chance, do me a favor, and don’t ever leave her side.
She loves you, and she’ll need you more than ever after today,” Jess said.

Lee knew that she was right. All the
guilt, anger, and self-pity wouldn’t help Trish out. He had to be what she
needed when, and if, he was given the opportunity. She wouldn’t need to see an
angry or scared face, but instead, she would need to see one of cool collected
confidence and most of all, love.

“You don’t have to worry about her. I’m
always going to be there for her,” Lee said.

As they looked up, something strange
was being shown on the television. There was footage of different places
burning that looked all too familiar, but unfortunately, everything was in
French, so Nathan couldn’t understand what was going on.

“What has happened?” Nathan asked Sam
as he pointed to the screen.

“There have been terrorist attacks in
several locations around the United States. The New York Subway, several night
clubs, and two movie theaters have all been hit. There are also reports of more
small events happening around the U.S.,” Sam said.

“So is it just me, or does it seem like
this is an answer for the attack we just carried out?” Dan asked.

“If it’s a counter attack, then these
guys sure answer fast,” Sam said.

“One thing’s for sure,” Jason said.

“What’s that?” Sam asked.

“I seriously doubt that Markus was in
that building. I would argue that this is an answer to the knife in the thigh
that Nathan gave him a few days ago,” Jason said.

“Isn’t it possible that this is someone
else doing this? Maybe he has a second in command or something,” Nathan said.

“It’s possible, but I really doubt it.
This is too perfect. It has Markus’s fingerprints all over it.”
 

The group stood there and talked about
the many scenarios that could account for what they were seeing on television
for some time, but the truth was that none of them had any concrete answers.
Eventually, Sam took out her phone and stepped away from the group. Zane had to
know what was going on.

* * * * *

Zane looked down at his ringing phone.
The caller I.D. showed a number he didn’t recognize, but he answered it anyway.

“Hello,” Zane said.

“Am I speaking with Zane Green?”
someone asked.

“Yes, you are. Who is this?”

 
“It’s nice to talk to you again after all
these years, Mr. Green. This is the man who put an end to John Campbell’s life,
and this is the man who is going to personally see to it that the person who
would dare attack one of his footholds dies a slow and painful death.”

Zane was shocked. Could this really be Markus?
He had hoped that he was inside of the facility when the bomb went off.

“Markus?”

“Yes. You aren’t near a television, are
you?” Markus asked.

“No, I’m not. Why?”

“Well, you need to find one soon. When
you make a statement, I’ll always make a larger one.”

Zane was curious to know what Markus
was talking about, but he was even more curious to know one other fact.

“How did you even get this number?”
Zane asked.

“I blew up a floor of your office. I
had enough people in the CIA to strike there. Do you not think I have enough
people to get a few numbers and to find out who the new leader is of the squad
that has been such a headache for me?”

“I suppose I shouldn’t have
underestimated you, but you have to know one thing. I’m not John Campbell. I
won’t hesitate, and I’ll chase you to the ends of the earth until I have your
head on a stick.”

“Do you believe that you can scare me
with such simple threats? Who do you love? Where do you go to blow off steam? And,
finally, what’s the most excruciating way you could possibly die? Think about
it, and realize that I’m going to find out all of those things. Everyone you
love will die, everywhere you like to go will soon cease to exist, and when you
think that death would be a blessing, I’ll show you how you were wrong by
making you suffer in ways that your tiny mind cannot even imagine. You see, you
think that you should be feared by me because of the man you used to be, but
according to my sources, you’re just a blind old man who is drowning in time. I
doubt that you’ll even see it coming when I come for you,” Markus said and hung
up the phone.

Zane wasn’t scared by Markus’s threats,
but he finally understood why Campbell was so nervous about taking down such a
man. Markus’s words could strike fear into even the bravest of men because you
knew that they weren’t just words. When he said that he was coming for you, he
truly meant it. Zane’s phone rang again. He answered it to hear the voice of a
panicked Sam. She explained to him about everything that was going on back at
home.

“Sir, I think that Markus may still be
alive and at the forefront of all this,” Sam said.

“I know he’s still alive. As a matter
of fact, he just called me.”

“What? What did he say to you?”

 
“I’m on my way there. We can all talk
about this once I arrive,” Zane said and hung up the phone.

As he was walking to his car, he only
shook his head. I can’t believe I actually thought this might end everything. I
just hope that everyone’s in this for the long haul, Zane thought as he got into
the car.

Once Zane arrived at the hospital and
went inside, he discussed the details of what was said when Markus contacted
him.

“So I guess this is far from over,”
Michael said in disappointment.

“I’m afraid so, and that’s why I’m
offering a onetime deal to almost all of you. If you want out now, then you can
get out. If you choose to stay, then I’m going to assume that you’re in this
until the end, so choose carefully,” Zane said.

“What do you mean by almost all of us?”
Nathan asked.
 

“The person I’m talking about knows who
they are. Their background is sensitive. If you aren’t sure if I’m talking
about you, then you aren’t who I’m talking about.”

That answer bothered Nathan. He knew
exactly who Zane was talking about. As he glanced at Sam, it didn’t appear that
she had a care in the world. It looked as if she expected such a stipulation to
be there for her.

“I’m staying,” Nathan said as he
stepped closer to Sam.

The truth was that he no longer wanted
to be involved in these types of things. He was mentally tired, and the fact
that death was starting to become routine to him was worrying him. He even felt
a twinge of excitement or accomplishment when they completed a mission. The feelings
of guilt and remorse that he had always felt were starting to fade, and Nathan
feared that he was becoming something that was altogether beneath him, but he
couldn’t leave Sam alone in this world. If she had to continue to live this
life, then so would he. It didn’t take long before everyone agreed except for
Lee.

“I’ll let you know my answer when I know
what Trish wants to do,” Lee said.

Zane only nodded. He understood that
the situation wasn’t so simple for Lee. After another hour of waiting, a doctor
came out of the back and sat down across from Lee. Sam translated for the two
of them.
 

“The bullet missed all her major organs,
but she lost a lot of blood. If she had gotten here two or three minutes later,
I don’t know if we would have been able to save her,” the doctor said.